Ten Thousand Leagues
by mumblytron
Summary: None of the guardians know what their names are, but this one calls himself Nemo. Nobody explains anything to him. He doesn't really know what's going on. But there are three things he does know: That he was dead. That he doesn't believe in absolutes. And that the Speaker, and everything he says, is full of crap.


His name... was something.

Nemo had been stumbling through the past few days with not a single inkling of what was going on, and every time somebody had the chance to explain it, they'd somehow manage to avoid telling him anything while simultaneously wasting minutes of his time. At first, his preoccupation had been with where he was and what he was doing, and although the clarification he had received on these topics was less than satisfactory, it was just stable enough to allow him to focus on another question –

What was his name?

It had occurred to him during his first visit to the Tower. Nearly everyone he spoke to had a name, and he did not. He was just "Guardian". "Eyes up, Guardian". "Good evening, Guardian." "Good luck, Guardian." It was more than a little annoying, and dehumanizing, on top.

Well, the fact that he wasn't actually human was dehumanizing, too. He was Conscious, or something. Awake? Awoken. Nobody'd explained that one, either, save for an offhanded comment he had received shortly after his arrival. But his hair was purple and he glowed, which he supposed was grounds enough for establishing a species barrier.

Nemo wasn't a name, of course. Nemo was just No-One, in a dead pre-Golden Age language. And the fact that he knew that, and also knew that it was the name of a long-forgotten fictional sea captain and a long-forgotten fictional clownfish, raised even more questions. Who was he? Where did he learn to summon bolts of Void light? And why did he know so much about pre-Golden Age science fiction?

He frowned out at the imperfect sphere that was the Traveller. It looked sinister to him, somehow, although nobody ever shut up about how great and good it was. It looked like a crappy beach ball to him. He wondered how benevolent everyone would think it was once its power ran out and it fell a mile to the ground and flattened the Last City.

Nemo wasn't sure where his cynicism came from. Maybe it was a personality trait, left over from whoever he had been before he'd died. Because he had to have been someone, right? In order to resurrect someone, they have to have existed in the first place. But perhaps he hadn't been a person at all. Maybe his Ghost - which was an extraordinarily suspicious series of floating articulated robot parts that spoke with the voice of someone desperately trying to pretend like they gave two fucks – had actually cobbled him together from rocks, dirt, and rusted car parts. Some of the Exos certainly looked as though that's where they had come from. Some of the humans, too. Maybe the tower was populated solely with Frankenstein's monsters.

Footsteps drew his attention away from his all-powerful beach-ball god. From the stairs to his left approached a man, dressed in white with his face hidden beneath a warlock's helmet. At least, Nemo _supposed_ it was a man, but the opaque mask meant it could have been a dreg and nobody would have been the wiser.

When Nemo turned to look at the being, it paused for a fraction of a second, as though it had recognized him. When the figure spoke, however, its voice carried the friendly authority of teachers and priests.

"There was a time," he began. "When we were much more powerful..."

And there was probably a time when I didn't run around making allusions to books nobody cares about, Nemo thought, but unless you're about to explain my amnesia or the fact that I was dead, you can go back up to your little balcony, and I'll go back to killing aliens with the superpowers I have somehow acquired.

Nemo's rapid-fire burst of internal sarcasm went unnoticed by the man in white. Slowly, he looked at the Traveller, and back at Nemo. He obviously delivered this speech several times a day. Nemo wondered if that was his only duty, or if he actually did something useful.

He spoke melodramatically, taking his time with each line. "...but that was long ago."

Nemo blinked at him, waiting for a little more elaboration on what the figure meant by "powerful" and "long ago". Of course Nemo knew what these terms _meant_ \- he wasn't stupid – but it was just so _vague_. Everyone here talked like they were writing fortune cookies. Perhaps nobody actually knew what was going on, and covered their ignorance by talking around the point like astrologers writing a horoscope, using language so unclear that it could mean literally anything.

"Until it wakes and finds its voice, I am the one who speaks for the Traveller," the figure said. By now, four sentences into the man's speech, Nemo had lost all hope that this conversation would be illuminating. The Speaker would turn out to be a medicine man, faking authority by speaking in riddles which had no answer. "You must have no end of questions, Guardian."

He dramatically approached the railing and gazed out at the Traveller. Nemo got the impression that the Speaker expected him to follow. He did not, choosing to remain standing where he was.

Whether out of confusion from Nemo's failure to come with him, or out of an intentional artistic impulse, it took the Speaker several more seconds to say anything else.

"In its dying breath the Traveller created the ghosts , to seek out those who can wield its light as a weapon..."

Nemo sensed that this was another riddle, another half-explanation, and interrupted. Although it was probably considered the pinnacle of rudeness to interrupt the voice of the Traveller, he couldn't help himself.

"You're telling me that I got conscripted by Dinky-bot over there to help fight a war I know nothing about. No. You're telling me I got _raised from the dead_ to wield superpowers or something. Why?"

The Speaker stood facing Nemo for a long moment, seeming unsure how to respond to this question. At last, haltingly, he spoke, trying desperately to keep the thread of his speech. "I – could tell you of the great battle, centuries ago. I could tell you of the power of the Darkness, its ancient enemy. There are many tales, told throughout the city to frighten children. Lately, those tales have stopped. Now, the children are frightened anyway."

Kind of a non-sequitur, Nemo thought. "Or you could tell me why you sent someone to rip me straight out of hell or wherever, instead of sending recruiters to the city. I mean, there are people down there, right? That we're protecting? Like, thousands of people. You could get some guardians from them instead of wasting time and money on dead guys. Like, set up a booth at the high school and say, hey, we'll pay for your college if you offer to fight the Fallen for us, be Guardian Strong."

The Speaker was silent. Nemo could feel his glare even through the opaque helmet.

The warlock held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Yes. Sorry. Darkness is coming to destroy the people who live in a city I am not allowed to go to. Got it. What can I do?"

"There are Guardians fighting on earth and beyond," the Speaker said. The kind, fatherly tone of his voice seemed forced this time. "Join them. Your ghost will guide you." He turned his head to look at Dinky-bot, and his irritation was so palpable that the little Ghost hid behind Nemo's shoulder. "I only hope he chose wisely."

With that, the figure went back up the stairs, and offered not a word more. Nemo, uncertain what had just occurred, turned to leave, feeling suddenly unwelcome.

"What was all that about?" he hissed.

Next to him, his Ghost clicked and whirred in thought. "You shouldn't do that," he said, at length. "The Speaker doesn't like being asked too many questions."

"Doesn't that defeat the point of having someone be the voice of the Traveller, if nobody's allowed to ask him anything? That's like having a magic 8-ball nobody's allowed to shake. Like every time you pick it up it says 'reply hazy, try again, the children are frightened anyway'."

Another thoughtful whine from the Ghost's machinery. "Just trust what he tells us," he said. "We're in this together now."

Nemo's paranoia flared up again. Perhaps the Speaker was not a hack, pretending authority to gain respect; perhaps he knew exactly what he was doing, withholding just as much information as he needed in order to gain blind obedience, in order to build an army to fight the Darkness. To hide something, to keep the Guardians from asking too many questions. But if the Traveller was so great and good, then what _was_ there to hide? What was the reason to be so vague?

"We need to go speak with Ikora Rey," his Ghost said. "In case you forgot. And, Guardian?"

Nemo looked the robot in his tiny glowing eye. He was seized with the sudden urge to swat the thing out of the air.

"Don't say anything stupid."


End file.
